Three in a Week

New Zealand Listener, Volume 36, Issue 921, 5 April 1957, Page 7

Three in a Week

Our opera guides usually describe the main YC link opera broadcast of the month, but wherever possible we bring to notice interesting operas coming from individual YC stations, This week there are three of these, so we compromise and give brief notes on each. HE best known of the week’s operas is La Gioconda, by Ponchielli-its composer’s greatest triumph. It tells the story of Barnaba, a spy of the Inquisition, who has evil designs on the ballad singer La Gioconda. The plot is so involved as to be in itself an argument for getting hold of a book of opera plots. La Gioconda has many "big" scenes-all the pageantry of 17th century Venice, inside and outside, and the spectacular ballet "Dance of the Hours" (1YC, Tuesday, April 9, 7.30 p.m.). Donizetti at his best writes sparkling melodies, but in La Favorita (2YC, April 11, 7.30 p.m.), he is in a more tragic vein. The hero of the opera. is a monastic novice, Fernanda, who falls in love with Leonora and in pursuit of her leaves his monastery, suffering many hardships before he finds her. His trials grow greater and seeking peace he returns to the monastery. Leonora comes

to find him only to fall dead in his arms. Donizetti wrote 67 operas, but it took him some time to free himself from the influences of Rossini, whom he greatly admired. L’Elisir D’ Amore and Lucia Di Lammermoor were two of the first to show his real powers, and a little later came Daughter of the Regiment, La ,_Favorita and one of his best comic operas Don Pasquale. Smetana is renowned for his Bohemian national operas, and his Bartered Bride is one of the great folk opéras of all time. The Kiss (3YC, April 12, 9.5 p.m.) is another folk opera. In it, Hanno, a young widower, is eager to kiss his bride, Marinka, before their marriagepopular belief has it that such a kiss arouses the anger of a dead wife. He succeeds, but only after many humorous complications.